Handel on the News

You're listening to Wake Up Call on demand from KFI AM six forty and now Handle on the news.

Ladies and gentlemen, here's Bill Handle.

Good morning, everybody, go handle here, morning crowd. It is a Tuesday, January fourteen, as we look at.

The fires hopefully yeah, we've got another fire weather.

Event.

Unfortunately it's happening today through tomorrow, so we'll be talking a little bit about that and hopefully we'll be talking about how it's not happening. So in the meantime, let me say hello, Amy, good morning.

Good morning.

Bill.

And Neil is back today. Good morning, Neil, Hey buddy, and they're god good, good, good good. I don't care.

Cono there you are. And and producer extraordinaire Hello Bill. Hello Chris Berry. I don't know if you guys know who is one of the senior senior people here at iHeart who's with us for a while. And he came into the studio just before we went on the air and said, Bill, I'd like to take the Morning crew to lunch or brunch after the show on Thursday to thank you guys for the great work you're doing. And I said, why would I want to have lunch with these people. I see them every day. Now, don't do

That will be going without you.

Yeah, pretty much.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, but you're going to order something to go and drop it off.

So you picked the place, Neil. Yeah, who the hell wants to hang out with the handle?

Yes, exactly.

So anyway, and this has been here like twenty four to seven dealing with this with the news.

So and he runs. I'm trying to remember what he does.

Chris, You like you run all the kiosks in the office buildings that iHeart is in, right, Yeah.

And I counted the coffee. Yeah, I keep the coffee yeah machine going.

I would like another cup please?

Yeah.

Yeah.

You know what I'll do Next time Pittman comes into the studio, which he does on occasion, I'm going to ask him that question. Do you mind getting me a cup of coffee?

Chris? You work with pittnamit send Berry over to get it. He probably will. All right, hello to everybody.

We're gonna do some offshoots of the fire story, the fire, of course, being by far the biggest story of well in terms of fires in the last I don't know decade. Here the worst fire in Southern California history. And we don't have to go through talking about the big and we're gonna have to go through talking about the complete decimation of Southern California. I mean, we've gone through that, So we're gonna do is at seven o'clock talk about how one of the problems with the fire is insurance

There's some six.

Hundred of them or nine hundred of them out on the fire line. He ran those crews for decades, that's what he did. So we're going to get an inside view of how that prison program works and the controversy. And there are people that, oh my god, you can't do that to prisoners, leave me alone. They don't make enough money. They're prisoners. So that's what's going on. So lots and lots of stuff. So in the meantime, let's do it, guys. Let's start with handle on the news

The strongest of the winds are expected between now and tomorrow at noon. The highest danger for winds this time have shifted a little bit. It's not for the Malibu area, but it's in western Los Angeles County and Ventura County, eastern Ventura County, So like the Santa Clarita area and that I five and fourteen corridors, those are going to be particularly hard hit by the winds expected to gust fifty five to seventy miles per hour.

Yeah, it's to be tough, that is absolutely.

If a fire starts and you have seventy mile an hour winds, you're back to We're back to where we were where the firefighters just have no chance, zero chance of containing a fire like that once it ignites. And so hopefully after this point. There was one fire that came out that started, but the firefighters were able to tackle that and bring it down, and that's the only chance. Now firefighters have a chance. The only chance they have to put out the fire is getting it very early.

And the good news is that unlike when the fire started last week, there's about ten thousand firefighters hanging out just waiting for those fires to start.

Yeah, And that is the question that I have, and that is we didn't anticipate these fires. We didn't anticipate the extent and the ferocity of these fires. And the only answer is to have thousands of firefighters waiting in

Typically in order to make this have.

Gone away, they would need twenty six thousand pieces of firefighting equipment.

That's how you control this fire. And it still wouldn't have happened.

And he said, we still would have no chance to do it because the fire was moving at such a rapid rate.

You couldn't out run the fire. You couldn't go at speed.

And outrun this fire. It was going so quickly with one hundred mile an hour winds. But to make a good road, we need twenty six thousand pieces of equipment, and we need thousands of firefighters waiting by the wings.

Okay, how reasonable is that. We're going to talk a.

Little bit more about one of the reasons we have so many fires and how we're so fire prone. Is I'm going to tell you later on, actually at seven o'clock why insurance is not expensive enough. That's our downfall. I know, I love this, I love this topic all right, making.

Fast work of a fire cruise rapidly got a handle on it. Had another fire that broke out just last night. It broke it started an Oxnard near the River Ridge golf Course. Throughout eight o'clock there was an evacuation order listed, but they said that no homes were in danger of being destroyed. But the fire has been confined to a river bet and it was stopped at about fifty six acres, still not showing atainment, but they've stopped the forward progress of it.

All right, what a difference DA makes? Hey, Los Angeles, see what I did there? Well, Angels County District Attorney Nathan Hawkman, God bless him, announced a number of charges against nine suspected looters and an alleged arsonist who isn't tied to any of these fires. But this was just over the past week as these wildfires raged throughout our

Oh my, I'm so suprised.

Hey, then Emmy's worth one hundred and fifty thousand dollars.

Is it really? Yeah?

You can't.

Oh wait, no, it's not.

It costs a few h undred dollars to make, but if it were made of solid gold, it would be worth one hundred and.

Fifty that's yeah, But some of them are.

When you look at some of the Academy awards that have been sold, they've gone for millions of dollars for iconic films, iconic scripts, they have literally gone for a zillion dollars.

That's what I was going to say, that it's continued upon what it was and where. But they're illegal to reproduce.

So oh yeah, I'm sure they're copyrighted.

By the way, his defense is going to be best performance for someone impersonating a burglar.

On television. Okay, So yeah, it was covered on TV, you know. Okay.

Governor Newsom wants to jump start recovery efforts for the wildfires with two and a half billion dollars. He expanded his legislative session agenda that is focused on Trump proofing California to include the response and recovery funding for the fires.

Yesterday, who was it that said yes to amy one of the new Trump folks coming in saying that we will go ahead and give federal money. Adam Schiff was being interviewed and he said that the Trump administration said they will give federal money to California if certain conditions are met. And he said, there's never been another time where Fed's have said, sure, we'll give disaster relief, but

I mean, that's going to be a four year battle. We know that.

And usually the vast amount of money that comes in for these kinds of disasters is federal money.

So there, yeah, okay, all right.

Homeowners and renters who lost their homes in the EAT and fire are now suing Southern California.

Edison saw this coming, So you had at.

Least five lawsuits were filed just yesterday alleging that the company failed to de energize all of its electrical equipment despite red flag warnings issued by the National Weather Service.

So well, see that video that was taken early early on in the Palisades fire, just when it started, and a couple of homeowners took a video where it looks like a fire was starting at the base of a transmission tower. Yeah, and we don't know yet if the fire had gone there or started there, and whether it did have anything to do with the power grid. But already the lawsuits have been filed even before we know, even before the investigation.

Is even begun. So we'll see if PG and E gets nailed for this.

Or no.

Southern California Edison, I think that was the utility, which was not touched by the PG and E settlement. You know, PG and E ended up paying billions of dollars and was convicted. The corporation was convicted of criminal activity because his power lines went down and sparked what was the last big fire? Whatever it was sparked that maybe it was the was it the campfire that it sparked?

And I don't know.

A very lucky man's luck has run out. The guy who won the largest ever powerball jackpot is Edwin Castro. He won the two billion dollar jackpot in twenty twenty three and promptly used some of his money to buy homes. He bought a home in Malibu, won an Altadena, and another one in the Hollywood Hills. Two of those homes were in evacuation zones. The third in Palisades burned to the ground.

I want to point something out as I read this story, and that is it's so.

Surprised that he would buy three homes.

Kind of interesting that one in Palisades, what an Altadena, and then a third in the Hollywood Hills.

Or fires started, Yeah, there was the fire in the Hollywood Hills last week.

Yeah, that's right. He must have burned the place down right. But I want you to notice, usually when someone buys a home. Remember one of the Powerball winners bought a home in Malibu for thirty twenty three or twenty five million dollars.

Look at the cost of these homes.

One is three point eight million dollars, another one is what two points something million dollars. Considering someone won a billion dollars, these are very modest homes.

It just occurred to me.

If I want a billion dollars, I wouldn't be built. I would buy a four million dollar home. I'd buy a forty million dollar home, which is what everybody does.

He has a twenty five point five million dollar mansion.

Well, yeah, that's besides the point. That's the one he lives in. So maybe these were rentals.

Those were for his help.

Could be, but I just noticed that he I brought fairly modest homes, so he's living under his means with a twenty five million dollar home.

Tom Hanks lost his house, didn't he do? I have that right.

I'm not sure if he lost it or if it was in the fire.

Was noted that twenty six million dollar home, so he gets paid more than scale.

I assume for his pictures.

He does, okay, all right.

Vladimir Zelenski said that he may send Ukrainian firefighters if needed, to help battle the blazes going on here in California. This was after Donald Trump Junior dragged the LA of Los Angeles County Fire Department for donating some supplies to Ukraine's defense.

So just on Sunday.

During the war, Yeah, when the war in Ukraine broke out, they had obviously firefighters there to put out the fires because artillery drones were hitting parts of Ukraine, and fire department donated hoses, nozzles, turnouts, helmets, body armor, personal protective equipment to help Ukraine.

And they're getting nailed for it.

Gee, if they'd been here, if that equipment had been here, the fires would have either been stopped or certainly would have done as much damage.

I mean, complete crap all. We're hearing a lot of that.

If Karen Vass had been on site, the fires wouldn't be as bad.

You think everything's been done right with these.

Fires, No, but what I think is happening. If everything had been done right, it wouldn't have helped.

That's all. These fires were so extraordinary, were.

So so vicious, so all encompassing, it did not matter. So you have one more reservoir, right that should have been full. It would have done nothing.

Nothing.

You're high that many gallons.

That is.

There was no water pressure up at the top of some of these hills.

That's what caused that.

You there was two people on the planet to think that nothing could be done.

Nothing could be done.

And by the way, you're right, there's only three of us, one being the chief of the LA Fire Department.

No, that's not what was said.

You also have the chief saying that money would have helped that other resources.

Really pull out, Yeah, pull that out.

I'd love to see that because from what I understand, Neil, it's nothing would have helped this fire.

What we should do now, we can't fight them.

They did let those homes burn because they couldn't stop them. They sat and watched those homes burn. They couldn't stop it. They couldn't now run the fire before.

There's so much that could have been done differently, like what and the firefighters doing an amazing john like what Neil.

Resources one.

We didn't even have uh, we didn't even have traffic cops showing where people were to go during the.

Time, Bring traffic everybody.

The traffic cops would have been part of the group that was just getting the hell out of Dodge as quickly as possible.

No one could stay in those areas.

Area for decades, and I have seen them controlled traffic for the Not in.

A fire like this, Neil, Not in this kind of fire. I'm telling you, Neil, for everything I have read and heard and saw, this fire was so intense, moving at such a rapid pace.

These were one.

Hundred mile an hour wins Neil, How do you stop it? The fire chief said, Based on what I said earlier, three fire units per house fire is typically what happens. We would have needed twenty six thousand of these fire units. And even then, the fire moves too quickly that.

At its peak blaze.

That's assuming that it would have gotten to its peak blaze.

It was untenable. It was you're right, you're right.

Had had we had you're right, had we had twenty thousand, had we had twenty thousand pieces of equipment at exactly those places where we needed, we probably could have stopped it. Had we had several hundred more airplanes. Oh no, you couldn't have airplanes because the winds were too high. Well, had we invented airplanes that could fly in one hundred mile an hour wins, that would have helped Neil, You're out of your mind. Communail, you're out of your mind. Go back to your facility.

Nothing short of criminal.

Jack Smith's report on his investigation into President elect Trump and his efforts to overturn the twenty twenty election has been released. Smith's team states, in no uncertain terms they believed Trump criminally attempted to subvert the will of the people and overturn election results. And I believe Jack Smith said he thinks he would have got a conviction.

Oh yeah, he cited a bunch of stuff.

Pressure on state officials, We know that who he called, We have that, we have that phone call, the fraudigal elect plan, the pressure on Vice President Mike Spence not to certify the riot on January sixth, and Jack Smiths said that this is all criminal, which a lot of us thought it was, and trying to subvert the election. What I don't understand is why President Trump try to stop this from being released so much because it proves to.

Him and his followers that all this was a witch hunt.

You think he would just wear it as a badge of honor instead of fighting fighting, fighting fighting to release the report, so it was released a week before he takes office.

Weird times. Let's hope this goes through.

Hamas is expected to release thirty three hostages during the first phase of an emerging ceasefire agreement to be finalized by negotiators there in Doha. To Israeli officials are the ones backing this the statement first positive sign we've seen in a long time, months and months that a truce between Israel and themas war may be in sight.

I have a question about this because Donald Trump has said if a deal is not cut before I take office, all hell is going to break loose in the Middle East.

How much of that.

Influenced Hamas and Israel because we know that happened before with Ronald Reagan and the return of the American hostages before Ronald Reagan took office at the end of the Carter administration, and Ronald Reagan was rightly given credit for speeding the process up because the Iranians were frightened of what was happening or what would happen if the hostages weren't returned, I wonder if Hamas was at all influenced by Donald Trump.

I think yes, I think he would have something to do with it. If Trump.

I mean, there were working, working, working, and they were getting closer and closer. But I don't think this would have wrapped up this week. But for Donald Trump being sworn in.

I think you're probably right. He's an interesting variable that they are afraid of.

I can imagine.

Yeah.

I mean, it's and he is so pro ISRAELI I mean, the guy makes no bones about it. There is no there's no middle ground, none of that. He is pro Israel, and Hamas knows that. Although I don't know how much more hell could break out in the Middle East, that's happening.

Now nothing short of criminal again. Special Counsel David Weiss slammed President Biden's characterization of his investigation. I remember Biden called Weiss's investigation into Hunter Biden raw politics when he pardoned his son. Weiss's prosecutors say they examined Hunter biden years of drug and alcohol abuse, is controversial, foreign business dealings, and procurement of a gun in twenty eighteen. Said his

Thank you. Especially effectively.

What Biden is saying is it was part of his view of the deep state that it was politics that did it, and Why said no, no, this is what we do. This is looking at it objectively. We do not politicize investigations. So you've got President Biden joining the fray of attacking the law enforcement agencies.

And investigative agencies.

In the United States, you know when it seems to go against you, And obviously Biden is guilty of this too.

It's a political witch hunt.

That's what he said, basically, is the attack the case against his son was effectively a political witch hunt. Without using those words, welcome to the modern era of politics.

Oh and all the Democrats that are upset about the stolen the stolen election.

That is going on and that Trump won.

Go figure, I haven't heard that very.

Much social media, my friend.

Well media is kind of crazy, but I the stolen election, by the way, was the majority of Republicans in this country, seventy five percent of registered Republicans said the election was stolen.

When Biden was sworn in.

You're not going to see seventy five percent of Democrats out there saying the estelle the election was stolen. I believe that Republicans are crazy when they thought the election was stolen. I think the Democrats who say this election was stolen are just as nuts. Hey, Bob, Hi, why don't we just count the votes to see who ends that?

Whatever happened to that?

Is that no longer part of our election cycle.

I don't believe in RS and d's. I believe people are just crazy.

Oh that's a good point.

Well, the days of hanging out or using the restroom at Starbucks have gone the way of the Dodo bird unless you buy something. They folks at Starbucks said yesterday that they're reversing a policy that invited everyone into its stores a new code of conduct.

Who would have thought that'd.

Go bonkers wrong here in southern California, but it did. They will be posted in all company owned North American stores banning you know, bans discrimination or harashment, harassment of people, consumption ab outside alcohol.

Well, yeah, that's I mean that's typical. But you have gone into Starbucks. I have occasionally, and they's someone sitting in the computer for two hours and having one cup of coffe.

Well, they're saying where this came from?

Back in twenty eighteen, you had two black men that were arrested in the Philadelphia Starbucks. They were having a business meeting, they weren't paying for anything, and they were arrested pretty horrifically if I remember.

And so then Starbucks is like, come one, come all.

Yeah, well that's cave.

Now they're going back to you've got to buy something in order to sit here for hours and hours, and maybe there's a limitation on that. What I love about this story is that Starbucks. Starbucks has said employees are going to receive training on enforcing the new policy. Okay, training other than hey you get out. How much more training do you need?

No buy e, no pe bye e.

Oh I'm I gonna go there. I would get in trouble if I went in that direction.

Okay, moving on, Hell are you even talking about?

Never mind?

DEI is aok with app l E. Apple's board of directors has recommended shareholders vote against a conservative think tanks proposal to consider scrapping Apple's DEI or diversity equity and includes inclusion initiatives. The National Center for Public Policy Research notified Apple in September that it intends to submit the anti DEA DEI proposal at Apple's annual shareholder meeting February twenty fifth.

Yeah, so they'll be a shareholder. You you can do it with one share standing up and making this motion. And Apple is saying we're the board said we're opposing that. Now, let me ask you a question in terms of inclusion and diversity. The fact that Tim Cook, who has been the CEO of Apple since twenty eleven, the fact that he is gay, and this would be considered a diversity obviously part of it is anti gay. How much of it do you think it is him being gay have

Why would that have to do with it?

Because it is this can be considered an anti gay statement.

No more diversity, right, we want we want to eliminate or decrease the diversity programs that Apple has. Well in the decreasing diversity. Part of diversity is the LGBTQ community. And I'm asking, is it because Tim Cook is gay that has any influence my guests, not particularly.

Apple's been doing this for a long time.

The first diversity program was nineteen ninety three, way before Tim.

Cook took over. So it's just a point. I want to make good point or bad point. I just want to bring something else into the mix.

I think it's legitimate.

All right, well, thank you. Don't accuse me of being anti gay here. I won't take it.

You who have actually passed laws to help the gay community, that's true. Yeah, okay, all right. Uh, Supreme Court Justice are pondering, of course, the future of TikTok in the United States.

We've all heard that. Well, guess what.

You can't keep kids from their social media. You got a bunch of American social media users that have responded by moving to another alternative alternative that is basically translated to a little Red Book, but kids call it red note.

Yeah, it's actually I mean, the official name is uh moo gooo guy app.

No, no, it's not.

A hugely popular social media app in China. It means little Red Book. But like I said, the kids kind of abbreviate it and call it red note.

What's the name of it.

It's Jaiu Hongzhu Xiao hung Shu shah.

It's a dish. You get a Panda Express.

No, it actually means little Red book, unless you're eating little red books.

Oh, I love Panda Express.

So I had his Pan Express yesterday. I had it yesterday.

It was very good. I had the bowl for the first time at panted Express.

That explains your haircut.

Okay, uh, Look who got a facelift.

Walmart has given its logo its first facelift in nearly twenty years. The company is sixty one years old, and yesterday unveiled the refresh of its brand identity. And I've got the the the logo side by side. They look almost identical.

Tell me if you could tell the difference.

Well, one's got a fatter font.

I uh, that's about it.

The same.

It's the same, just a little tiny bit fatter.

Yeah, it's like going from aerial to aerial bold.

I was a graphic designer for a bazillion years, used to make design corporate IDs and logos.

I don't know the difference. Yeah, it looked like it.

It looks like a pre holiday, post holiday, just a little chubbier.

I want to know how much the graphic design company got paid for that.

Look at the news with that great story when NBC came out with its new peacock and they spent a quarter of a million dollars with a graphic design.

It turned out.

That they hated They had to pay off a PBS station in Nebraska someplace that had come up with that years before, and they paid someone one hundred bucks for it. And it was the NBC, the new NBC peacock. Remember that story, Neil.

Oh, Yeah, they referred to it as the big cock block.

Uh yeah, well, okay, we're gonna talk about that later on too.

I can't remember something.

No, but it was hilarious. I mean the fortune they spent on it to design that. It turned out it was already designed for one hundred dollars someplace else. Also, have you noticed and I like to look at various branding things, Uh Kia when they switched to their logo, I thought that was brilliant. By the way, the way their their letters are, the way they spell Kia and the designs are.

Just all they got it. That's a beautiful logo.

It is.

That's the point I'm making that they went to a logo that's just brilliant. All right, guys, we're done with all of that. KFI AM six forty live right here on KFI AM six forty.

You've been listening to wake Up Call with me Amy King. You can always hear wake Up Call five to six am Monday through Friday on kf I AM six forty and anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app.